Browse the term static site generators, and you'll find plenty of them, in different languages, with lots of features, and what not. But if you're a developer then building your own is easier than you might think, and it's an excellent opportunity to learn some things in the process.
The Back Story
When I looked at my work routine, then the setup of basic web architecture for a new project was something which took more than 20% of my time. And reinventing the wheel daily was something which was bothering me a lot.
I figured out the basic needs of my web-dev workflow and realized that it shouldn’t be that hard to build something small, with just the right features I need.
The Requirements
The requirements this generator must satisfy are:
- 🤝 It's for quick-prototyping of impressive little static demos for teaching, presenting and making landing pages,
- ⚡️ Use Pug to generate HTML files — coz pug is awesome.
- 🎯 Handles Sass to CSS conversion — coz why not.
- 🔥 Live reloads the browser with BrowserSync.
Line of Action
Here it is, I'm building a JavaScript-Based static site generator so wish me luck! When I got started, I only wanted it to cater my web-dev workflow needs. As I went ahead developing it, I realized that it could serve the purpose of several other developers as well.
But now I am working on some advanced functionalities. And after I get ready with its first version, I plan to open source it. This way I can contribute my effort to makes the lives of developers easy and effective.
Progress
If I track my project status currently, then here is the timeline of things that are left to do:
- ✅ Testing
- 📖 Updating the docs
- 🚀 Releasing updates/commits
- ✍️ Working on its launching blog post
- 🎨 Designed its logo/name/featured image
- 🙌 Sending to some good folks for beta testing
Launch Date
Right now I am truly excited about this project, and it's been a great learning experience for myself. Still working out on some tiny miny details so, it'll be tough to share an exact date with you folks. Precisely, if everything sticks to plan then I'll be able to open-source it by the end of this month (i.e., September 2018).
Till then stay tuned for more updates. You can drop in your feedback in the comments section below. Or you can also reach out to me through my Twitter account @MaedahBatool.
Top comments (7)
Hi Maedah. I think this could be a fun project and I don't mean to dissuade you, but have you tried out one of the 458 (as of current count) static site generators out there? I just ask because there are a lot of existing js-based ones that meet those simple requirements and your insight might help improve one or more of them as a contributor.
If you are choosing the project just as a fun learning experiment, by all means, go for it. But if your goal is to have an impact on the overall static site generator ecosystem, then I think bringing your insight and expertise into one of the long list of existing tools would be worth considering.
Either way, good luck!
Good luck!!
Thank you! 💯
Best of Luck!
Thanks a ton. 💯
Looking forward! ✌️
Yes... of course! 💯